Both Sides Now
You know that feeling you get in your muscles after you return to exercise after many weeks of laziness? that's how it feels to return to the world right now. I've been walking around in a haze. Not depressed really. More like numb. There's this device used in the theatre called a scrim. You use it when you want a scene to have a shadowy opaque-like feel to it. You can see the characters and the actions on the stage but it is as if they the scene was covered in smoke. And that's how I've felt. I continued living, so to speak-going through the motions of working, socializing and generally being myself. But it wasn't real. Nothing felt tangible. If I'm being honest I don't think that I really wanted it to. I think that I was afraid of what I would find beneath the surface if I let feelings in.

But I'm back. I'm sitting here after a loooong day of work listening to Cloin Hay and it is painfully clear that I have been awoken from this slumber. His voice is piercing through me like shards of broken glass on my fingertips. It feels as if my heart is literally being squeezed by a fist. And as gut-wenching as it is I am grateful to feel alive again. I am not someone who is comfortable in that state of limbo. Whatever life hands to me I normally want to experience to the fullest. But I think this time it was just too much all at once and I completely shut down. Self-preservation some would call it.

But now, almost 6 weeks after all of the shit hit the fan with relationship, roomate and family, I feel ready. Ready for whatever life brings. I came out of work on Friday from a patient's home excited to start the weekend and found that someone had smashed my car and left it. At first I had a good cry cursing the universe for my bad luck and added it to the list of my current misfortunes. But then I sat back and gave myself a talking to-

Look this is life. Ups and downs. Peaks and valleys. For better or worse. and it truly is remarkable.


Once again Joni says it best:

-I've looked at life from both sides now. From win and lose and still somehow it's life's illusions I recall. I really don't know life at all-

Just in the past year I've moved twice, fallen in Love unexpectedly with a lovely young man, watched my 2 best friends get married, gotten a promotion, started a blog, read a ton of books, been given a second chance that I didn't deserve and was true to my promise, been the victim of a hit and run, reunited with my oldest friends, applied to grad school, witnessed patients' deaths, taken my nephew bowling, strung lights on my christmas tree, fallen down the stairs, learned to Love spin class, cried with my dad over my mom's illnesses, started singing again, had my heartbroken, taken a million pictures, had a whole lot of wednesday nights at nina's, swam alone in the ocean, gotten my first (and soon tobe second) therapist, had 365 first morning sips of coffee, made meatballs, counseled a friend through a break-up, given someone a second chance, and a million other incredible big and small milestones. And most importantly I ahve begun to truly Love myself for who I am for the very first time...

So bring it on life. I'm so ready for what you've got...